Killer Game Programming in Java Author: Andrew Davison | Language: English | ISBN:
0596007302 | Format: EPUB
Killer Game Programming in Java Description
Although the number of commercial Java games is still small compared to those written in C or C++, the market is expanding rapidly. Recent updates to Java make it faster and easier to create powerful gaming applications-particularly Java 3D-is fueling an explosive growth in Java games. Java games like Puzzle Pirates, Chrome, Star Wars Galaxies, Runescape, Alien Flux, Kingdom of Wars, Law and Order II, Roboforge, Tom Clancy's Politika, and scores of others have earned awards and become bestsellers.
Java developers new to graphics and game programming, as well as game developers new to Java 3D, will find Killer Game Programming in Java invaluable. This new book is a practical introduction to the latest Java graphics and game programming technologies and techniques. It is the first book to thoroughly cover Java's 3D capabilities for all types of graphics and game development projects.
Killer Game Programming in Java is a comprehensive guide to everything you need to know to program cool, testosterone-drenched Java games. It will give you reusable techniques to create everything from fast, full-screen action games to multiplayer 3D games. In addition to the most thorough coverage of Java 3D available, Killer Game Programming in Java also clearly details the older, better-known 2D APIs, 3D sprites, animated 3D sprites, first-person shooter programming, sound, fractals, and networked games. Killer Game Programming in Java is a must-have for anyone who wants to create adrenaline-fueled games in Java.
- Paperback: 998 pages
- Publisher: O'Reilly Media; 1 edition (May 1, 2005)
- Language: English
- ISBN-10: 0596007302
- ISBN-13: 978-0596007300
- Product Dimensions: 7 x 9.2 x 2 inches
- Shipping Weight: 3 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
This book is miles ahead of other Java gaming books... For one thing, this is an excellent book in its own right. For another, the other existing books on the topic suck.
Anybody who spends a lot of time writing games in Java ends up running into certain challenges. For each of these real issues, it takes a lot time to identify the issue then many hours to come up a satisfactory solution or work-around. This book saves you from 99% of that work. The author has documented nearly every complication that you will run into. The other Java gaming books explain how to apply common sense and traditional gaming strategies to the Java APIs (usually following Sun's tutorials exactly), giving step-by-step instructions on how to do so. Besides the point that this adds no value for somebody capable of following Sun's tutorials and APIs, they offer no help where you need it most... where the straight-forward approach is unsatisfactory or just doesn't work for some reason.
Another thing that has saved me a ton of frustration and time is advice from the author. For my specific game project I've run into several questions which I've been unable to answer by web searches, posting to forums, etc. I've emailed Davison (the author), and he has answered each of my questions concisely and to the point every time. (I don't want you to spam him, so please don't send questions until after you have looked for the answer in his book!).
To address concerns that other reviewers have posted:
This book is not just for "advanced" Java developers. As Davison has emailed me, the intended audience is, "someone who has just got past their first Java course". He purposefully avoids avoids all but elemental Java features (e.g.
This is one of the most interesting books I have read on the subject of game programming in Java. In addition, it is a great tutorial on how to use Java to accomplish a number of multimedia programming objectives independent of game programming. Since there is no table of contents shown, I will summarize the book's contents in the context of the table of contents:
1. Why Java for Games Programming? - Many discussions are revisited about why Java is not a bad choice for game programming- speed, memory leaks, etc.
2. An Animation Framework - The animation algorithm developed through most of this chapter is embedded in a JPanel subclass (called GamePanel), which acts as a canvas for drawing 2D graphics. The animation is managed by a thread which ensures that it progresses at a consistent number of frames per second.
3. Worms in Windows and Applets - The threaded animation loop of chapter 1 is tested inside a windowed application and an applet. The programs are all variants of the same WormChase game.
4. Full-Screen Worms - Three approaches to full-screen games are investigated.
5. An Introduction to Java Imaging - The aging AWT imaging model is discussed, followed by the BufferedImage and VolatileImage classes, ImageIO, and the wide range of BufferedImageOp image operations offered by Java 2D.
6. Image Loading, Visual Effects, and Animation - This chapter examines how to efficiently load and display images, apply visual effects such as blurring, fading, and rotation, and animate them.
7. Introducing Java Sound - The Sound API is compared to the Java Media Framework (JMF), and the recently introduced JOAL, a Java binding to OpenGL's music API.
8.
Killer Game Programming in Java Preview
Link
Please Wait...